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I’m a sysadmin for a small company.

Frankly, I’m sick and tired of Microsoft changing the interface purely for change’s sake.

Office 2007 was a disaster. Hours of confusion and retraining because MS decided to move everything around for no good reason. Years of user familiarity with those programs suddenly of little value.

Now they want to radically change the OS? Why?

I don’t want to be impressed or wow’ed by the OS. I just want it to provide a reliable platform to run our apps.

For most business, computers aren’t cute little toys we use for entertainment. They’re valuable tools we rely on to conduct our business. From the looks of Win8, I can’t see a reason to recommend moving to this platform. The user retraining and lost productivity will cost far more than the upgrade cost. And what’s the benefit, other than eventually being forced by MS to upgrade?

We’ve looked at Linux on the desktop in the past, but never pursued it because changing the user environment that radically wasn’t worth the cost. Windows 8 seems to make Linux much more attractive.

Frankly, I’m sick and tired of Microsoft changing the interface purely for change’s sake.

Absolutely!

Their ribbon menuing is the most asinine change they have ever made, except for the jumping around in file explorer.

Also, their changed interface with the disappearing/reappearing links in many areas is downright stupid. I have to move my mouse pointer all over the 'box' and guess that I might find a link. BRING BACK BUTTONS and pulldown menus! They made it obvious were the links were.

Designers of ~~both~~ all three should be shot, and they shouldn't even wait until sunrise.

>> Frankly, I’m sick and tired of Microsoft changing the interface purely for change’s sake.

You mean like IE9? Buttons that were on the left are now on the right &etc. No new functionality, no new benefit, just change for change’s sake. Makes me a little MORE insane than I already was.

“We’ve looked at Linux on the desktop in the past, but never pursued it because changing the user environment that radically wasn’t worth the cost. Windows 8 seems to make Linux much more attractive.”

If all the user needs is the functionality of a web browser and an “office” environment, Linux fills the bill nicely. Even the latest Ubuntu can be tweaked in minutes to resemble Windows XP so well that it takes the average person a little while to figure out they are not running Windows. Perhaps Joe Sixpack could not set up Linux to that extent, but any competent IT Dept. should be able to if I can do it (’cuz I don’t even know Unix).